Jan Wrobel

Jan Wrobel was a Polish immigrant ranch manager in Texas during the early 20th century.

Biography
Jan Wrobel was born in Silesia, Prussia to a Polish family, and he grew up with a distrust for Germans. During the late 19th century, he immigrated to the United States and became a smallholder in Texas, managing the Painted Sky ranch. In 1899, he took a loan from loanshark Leopold Strauss, and, when he was unable to repay it, Strauss sent outlaw Arthur Morgan to collect the debt from Wrobel. Morgan showed up at Wrobel's ranch at night and beat him, and Wrobel, who spoke mostly in Polish, pleaded for Morgan to take whatever he needed. He tried to convince him to just take some cigarettes that he had stolen, but he was devastated when Morgan stole his antique pocketwatch and his liquor. Morgan then left the ranch with his pockets full, returning the payments to Strauss.

Despite the incident with Morgan, Wrobel continued to live on the Painted Sky ranch for over ten years. In 1907, the fugitive outlaw Ramon Cortez took Wrobel hostage and hid in his barn, and the bounty hunter John Marston (a friend of Morgan's) rescued Wrobel and captured Cortez before taking him to the sheriff's office in Rhodes, Louisiana.